Nothing is as it seems: $6.3 million to connect trails along the Grand River, while racial and economic injustice consume this city
On Monday, MLive posted an article entitled, Grand Rapids planning $6.36M trail connector along Grand River.
The article states that the federal, state, city and private money necessary to come up with $6.3 million, will be used to connect a bike and pedestrian trail from Leonard St to Riverside Park. As of now, people have to walk on sidewalks or ride their bikes on Monroe in the designated trail connector area.
Walking or biking along the Grand River is a nice thing, and as someone who lives near Riverside Park, I enjoy riding my bicycle through the park or onto the White Pine Trail that is at the north end of the park.
However, the $6.3 million, in reality, is not just to connect the existing pedestrian trail. The whole push from the City of Grand Rapids and the Grand Rapids Whitewater group, is also about development along the Grand River. I mean, look at the list of funders for Grand Rapids Whitewater. It is the same families that dictate the same pro-business bullshit that dominates this city.
In an August 2020 blog post on Grand Rapids Whitewater, the writers claim that these development projects are all about promoting equity. Hell, they even quote Dr. King. Why it is that people are always quoting Dr. King, but never really understand the radical vision and demands that Dr. King was advocating for until he was assassinated? Anyway, Grand Rapids loves to use that term equity, and why not, since the more you use it the more you can convince people that is what this city is committed to.
However, despite the constant claims of equity, Grand Rapids has the largest wealth gap of any city in Michigan, with Black, latinx and indigenous communities subjected to poverty at alarming rates. Grand Rapids has a significant unhoused population that is increasingly being criminalized and the amount tax breaks that continues to be given to developers and corporations in this community is staggering.
Again, I like riding my bike along the river, but I am more committed to real equity and racial justice than I am to projects that seem trivial in the face of all the injustice that is going on in Grand Rapids and all the suffering that is going, especially in the midst of a pandemic.
It is instructive to observe that when these kinds of projects are evolving, the City of Grand Rapids always seems to be able to find funding to make it happen. In this case, as it states in the MLive article, the trail connector project would use federal, state, city and private donors.
If the City can find money to connect a bike and pedestrian trail, then why can’t they find money to end homelessness, to create truly affordable housing for all, end hunger, end poverty or provide Black residents in the southeast part of town funding to development their own neighborhoods in a way that lets them be in control of that reality?
$6.3 million is a number, but how could that number be used to address some of the glaring racial and economic injustices in this city?
It would provide 437 families rent money for 12 months coverage of $1,200 a month.
It would provide 126 families the ability to each put a down payment of 50,000 on a home.
It would provide 525 families a food budget for one year at $1000 per month.
Now, these number don’t tell everything. If families that are the most marginalized right now, were able to have rent relief or a food budget at those number, it would provide tremendous relief to families who would not have to worry about utilities or health care as much. But of course, this just provides people with some relief, since the greater goal is real racial and economic justice.
If we were allowed employ radical imagination to the serious social inequities we face, we could also find more longterm solutions that would do away with the business as usual approach, the White Savior approach and the reliance on rich philanthropists who also exploit people and buy politicians approach, to how we address systemic and structural racism and poverty in this community. Nothing is as it seems. Yes to bike and pedestrian trails, but not until racial and economic justice is achieved!
Two weeks ago, we began out first installment of this regular posting, which takes a critical look at Grand Rapids politics and policies, based primarily on the public record, such as committee agendas and minutes.
We continue our look at Grand Rapids politics today, with some observations about the Grand Rapids City Commission’s Committee of the Whole and general City Commission meeting agenda packets for January 26th, which can be found at this link.
Two brief observations having to do with tax breaks for business, at the expense of the public and then a more detailed look at a recent “survey” done in Grand Rapids, having to do with the GRPD.
Back in early December, we reported on the DeVas-created AmplifyGR group, in conjunction with their partner, Rockford Construction, to seek tax breaks for a new business project that will be located at 1601 Madison SE, in Grand Rapids. The business that would occupy 1601 Madison SE was not revealed in early December, but the Director of AmplifyGR was quoted in MLive, saying, ““We’re hoping that by the end of the year we can be a little bit more public with that. So hopefully it’s a matter of weeks and not months.
It has been nearly two months since the AmplifyGR Director made this comment and still there is no mention of the name of the business that will benefit from $2.2 million in tax breaks from this development project for a private company. City officials will likely vote on this matter, despite the fact that AmplifyGR and Rockford Construction cannot be transparent which company will be the beneficiaries of public funding.
Also on the docket today is a proposal to provide both state funds and 12 years of tax breaks to the global self-care company Perrigo, which wants to build a facility at 400 Monroe NW in Grand Rapids. My question is, why does the State and the City need to provide massive tax breaks to a global corporation that had over a billion dollars in sales in their last quarterly report?
The State of Michigan has already committed $2 million to this relocation, and add to that 12 years of tax breaks from the City of Grand Rapids, and we are talking about a good sum of money, money that could benefit families that are struggling financially, with housing, health care and food insecurity.
Lastly, the City of Grand Rapids will likely vote on a 1 year pilot project with the private group known as Governance Sciences Group, Inc to provide FlashVote services for an estimate amount of $14,900. Essentially, what FlashVote is, is an online survey system, designed to solicit public input on issue.
The City of Grand Rapids is particularly interested in getting feedback on the GRPD, and in their Agenda Packet (beginning on page 95), it states it will also support the Police Department strategic plan.
As someone who has been involved in Defund the GRPD, I find this so-called survey suspect. First, on page 99 of the Agenda Packet, the City of Grand Rapids already did a test run in September, soliciting input on the GRPD. It says that 335 people were invited to participate, yet there is no methodology on how people were invited, nor the demographics of people invited.
Second, there are 5 questions for people in this survey, questions that are definitely crafted in such a way that avoids any serious critique of the GRPD, such as:
- Please rate how safe you feel in your neighborhood?
- Which best describes the police presence in your neighborhood?
- Which best describes you interactions with GRPD officers over the past 12 months?
- Which of the following are true for you, if any?
- Any other comments or suggestions to improve public safety and community trust in the Grand Rapids Police Department?
Question number 4 does provide a vague option to allocate resources outside of the GRPD, but it fundamentally avoids the issue of defunding and the reasons behind that campaign. On pages 102 & 103 of the Agenda Packet, there are written responses to Question 5, which are instructive at some level, but misleading since we do not know the demographics of those surveyed, nor how they were chosen. This speaks to a third point about why this survey is highly problematic and fundamentally demonstrates that the city wants to control the narrative about the GRPD, just like they did with the online survey in August, and in general, since the May 30th rebellion and the calls for defunding the GRPD.
We all know that Black and Brown residents have a much different lived experience that White people do when it comes to the police. There is also a socio-economic difference with how the cops deal with members of the Capitalist Class and how they deal with the working class poor. The GRPD has a heavier presence in poor neighborhoods that are disproportionately represented by Blacks and latinx communities, which is by design.
Fourth, as we wrote in early July, despite the City receiving thousands of letters from people calling for a reduction of funding for the GRPD and some City Commission support, the City Attorney and City Manager did an end run saying that the City Commission could not vote on reducing the funding for the GRPD. All of the groups involved in that effort were told that by November of 2020, the City would make a decision on this matter, but what happened is that the issue of defunding the GRPD was completely taken off the table, which leads this writer to conclude that City officials never intended to deal with defunding, not at least until they had more control over the narrative.
Lastly, instead of paying private companies to solicit controlled input, why doesn’t the City of Grand Rapids begin the process of using participatory budgeting, which would allow for all residents in Grand Rapids to have a say in how public tax money is used in this city. This would be a more honest and more intentional way of getting public input, plus it would mean that the City of Grand Rapids would have to give up the power to control how public money gets spent.
Black excellence is a threat to Whiteness and White Supremacy: The Legacy of Hank Aaron
The world lost one of the best all time baseball players, with the passing of Hank Aaron.
I grew up watching Aaron play in the late 60s and 70s, all the way up to his retirement from baseball. Hank Aaron was so good, that he is the all time leader in RBIs and total bases. Hank Aaron also played in 25 All Star games.
As great a baseball player that Hank Aaron was, he was an amazing human being and ambassador for the game. Aaron was not overly political and he wasn’t flashy, but that didn’t mean anything for a Black athlete who came into the Major Leagues in the 1950s.
Hank Aaron got his start in the Negro Leagues, but in April of 1954, Aaron was signed by the Milwaukee Braves, a team he played for throughout most of his career.
We all know how Jackie Robinson broke the color-barrier, when he was signed by the Brooklyn Dodgers, but sometimes we forget that other Black baseball players and Black athletes faced constant harassment, intimidation, discrimination and threats against their life. The irony is, that the greater the player you were, the more intense the threats were.
According to Dave Zirin’s book, A People’s History of Sports in the United States, the year (1973) before Hank Aaron surpassed Babe Ruth’s all time home run record, Aaron had received 930,000 letters, most of which were filled with vicious insults and death threats. Zirin writes:
Samples of the letters read, “Dear Hank Aaron, How about some sickle cell anemia, Hank?; Dear Nigger, You black animal, I hope you never live long enough to hit more home runs than the great Babe Ruth.” Aaron later wrote, “The Atlanta fans weren’t shy about letting me know what they thought of a $200,000 nigger striking out with men on base.”
Zirin also noted that when Aaron did break Bath Ruth’s home run record on April 8, 1974, against the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Commissioner of Baseball, Bowie Kuhn, didn’t even bother to show up to witness and congratulate Aaron.
Playing baseball takes skill and dedication. As someone who played baseball competitively in men’s summer leagues, I am aware of how important dedication to the game is. Yet, the very fact that Hank Aaron, a Black baseball player was going to pass the home run record of White icon Babe Ruth, was what prompted so many death threats against Hank Aaron. It wasn’t because Aaron was on the front lines of the Black Freedom Struggle or because he endorsed groups like the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, rather it was because his excellence as a Black athlete threatened the very essence of Whiteness and White Supremacy.
And just to be clear, White Supremacy is not only what dictates the actions of the Proud Boys, the KKK or Trump supporters who stormed the US Capitol, White Supremacy is what the US was founded on, and White Supremacy still dictates so much of US society that we don’t even recognize it.
In a world that runs on White Supremacy, it is paramount that we honor the legacy of Hank Aaron, for what he meant to the game of baseball and how much White hatred/White Supremacy he had to endure. Hank Aaron, Rest in Power!
Enbridge says they won’t comply with Governor’s orders, runs new radio ads attacking Whitmer for not caring about working families
For more than a week, the powerful Enbridge Corporation has stated publicly that they will not comply with Gov. Whitmer’s order to shut down Line 5, since the announcement from the State of Michigan that the oil giant cannot use the public easement.
On January 12th, Vern Yu, executive vice president and president, liquids pipelines, of Enbridge, sent a 7 page letter to Gov. Whitmer, outlining why the fossil fuel corporation will not comply with the government’s order.
Here is part of what that letter contained:
We have carefully reviewed the Notice of Revocation and Termination of 1953 Easement (“Notice”) that we received on November 13 from Mark Totten, Chief Legal Counsel to the Governor. Our review shows that the State lacks the authority to terminate or revoke the 1953 Easement. Enbridge’s court filings since November 13 make clear why “termination” or “revocation” of the Easement is contrary to federal law. Moreover, as discussed in detail below, the Notice fails to specify an existing violation of Easement terms that would justify termination.
For these reasons, we intend to operate the Dual Lines until the replacement pipeline under the Straits within the Great Lakes Tunnel is placed into service, as per our existing Agreement with the State of Michigan and consistent with PHMSA federal regulatory requirements. Enbridge already has requested that the United States District Court allow us to move to dismiss the civil suit the State filed in an attempt to enforce the November 13 Notice. In responding to the Notice’s claims here, Enbridge preserves all of its legal arguments, including that the federal Pipeline Safety Act preempts Michigan’s attempt to enforce its own safety standards on the Dual Lines or to take any action to close the Dual Lines.
The Enbridge letter, ends with these words of defiance:
For all of the reasons discussed, the November 13 Notice is not a valid exercise of the State’s authority under the Easement. Accordingly, the Easement will not terminate or be deemed “revoked” at the end of the 180-day period, as the Notice seeks. Our dual pipelines in the Straits are safe, fit for service and in full compliance with the federal safety standards that govern them.
We trust you will respond positively to our offer to participate in good-faith discussions to resolve any differences. In the meantime, the Dual Pipelines will continue to operate safely until they are replaced on completion of the Tunnel Project, as per the 2018 Agreements. Enbridge will vigorously defend its rights under the Easement in pending court actions, and fully expects that its legal positions will prevail.
Shortly after it became public that Enbridge would not comply with the State’s order, the Michigan League of Conservation Voters released their own statement, which read in part:
Enbridge’s irresponsible refusal to comply with Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s decision is a slap in the face to Michigan families who care about our Great Lakes and clean drinking water more than Big Oil profits.
The refusal by Enbridge to comply with the Governor’s orders demonstrates their arrogance, but more importantly it demonstrates the power this corporation has. Would a small business be able to get away with failure to comply with state orders? Would any citizen group or individual? Enbridge’s defiance on this matter also demonstrates that they have very deep pockets to fight any efforts to halt their profit-making ability, through litigation.
Propaganda on the airwaves
For years, Enbridge has been running paid advertising, which for corporations can be written off as a business expense in their tax filings. Enbrdige runs both TV and radio ads throughout the Michigan market, specifically related to Line 5 and their proposed tunnel.
Now, Enbridge is running new ads that are not only attacking Gov. Whitmer for attempting to shut down Line 5, the ad is actually saying that the State of Michigan doesn’t care about working families.
This new radio ad, which I have heard in the Grand Rapids market, is very misleading and disingenuous. How can Enbridge claim that it cares about working families? Working families are always the hardest hit from the environment disasters that Enbridge has perpetrated all across the US, as can be seen in the 10 year graphic on the right, from the National Wildlife Federation.
In addition, the claim that Enbridge cares about working families is false, because Climate Change disproportionately impacts the poor and working class families around the globe and in Michigan.
However, we cannot rely on the courts or the State of Michigan to shut down Line 5 and to dismantle any and all Enbridge pipelines. We need to support direct action campaigns, like we saw at Standing Rock and like the one that is happening right now against Line 3 in Minnesota. The future of the Great Lakes should not be left up to the judicial process or the greed of corporations like Enbridge. Shut Down Line 5 Now!
Founders of the American Patriot Council were involved in the January 6th Siege at the US Capitol
In the last few days, there have been photos of the co-founders of the American Patriot Council, Ryan Kelley and Jason Howland, at the January 6 siege on the US Capitol.
The pictures of Kelley, at least the ones I have seen, shows him outside, like the picture here on the right.
The fact that the “Founding Fathers of the American Patriot Council,” as they like to refer to themselves as, were at the January 6th siege on the US Capitol is not a surprise to people who have been following and monitoring these two men.
Kelley and Howland were instrumental in organizing many of the anti-lockdown protests in Lansing, beginning in April of 2020, and they organized the anti-lockdown protest in Grand Rapids in May.
In October, we wrote how the American Patriot Council not only had a relationship with some of the white men who plotted to kidnap Gov. Whitmer, we also wrote that they created a climate for this type of violence.
What is interesting about Kelley and Howland’s involvement in the January 6 siege, is that one of the core values of the American Patriot Council, based on what is listed on their website, states:
Nonviolence is a way of life for courageous people.
- We condemn acts of violence, especially to achieve political gain.
- We do not tolerate lawless behavior or illegal actions.
If Howland and Kelley really believe this core value, which is questionable, then their attendance and participation in the January 6th siege at the US Capitol is in direct contradiction of the value of non-violence. This is especially true of Jason Howland, as he was inside the US Capitol building on January 6, based on the photo here below. The only way for anyone connected to the January 6th siege to get into the US Capitol building that day, was by force.
Ryan Kelley and Allendale
Many people are also aware that Ryan Kelley sits on the Planning Commission for Allendale Charter Township. There has been an effort since this past summer to get the Allendale Charter Township governing board to remove Ryan Kelley from the Planning Commission. Up til now that effort has been unsuccessful. In addition, according to a recent Facebook post, some people have shared the pictures of Kelley at the January 6 siege at the US Capitol with Allendale Charter Township Trustee Adam Elenbaas, who still maintains that unless Kelley did anything illegal on the January 6th, the Allendale Charter Township Board of Trustees, “legally cannot remove him from his position as he was not acting on behalf of his “role” with the township” on January 6th. Spoken like a true politician.
For those who want to be involved in an organized effort to remove Ryan Kelley from the Allendale Charter Township Planning Commission, please contact Justice for Black Lives or the group Take It Down Allendale.
As for the American Patriot Council, we will continue to monitor them and write critiques and provide analysis of what they are up to, based on what they post on their website and their YouTube channel.
We are all familiar with what happened on January 6, 2021, at the US Capitol. White Nationalists stormed the US Capitol building, destroying property along the way and using violence against people, resulting in several deaths. There has been a constantly flow of news since that day and it will be part of the narrative for the Inauguration as well.
However, four years ago today, there was an action during the inauguration of Donald Trump, where no government buildings were under siege, but some property was damaged. This protest is less known, even though it involved people who identified as anti-fascists.
One glaring difference between these two events so far, is that the January 20, 2017 (from here on referred to as J20) activists were facing up to 70 years in jail, while those involved in the January 6, 2021 (from here referred to as J6) action are facing lesser chargers or are already having charges dismissed by some judges.
The other fundamental difference it that the J6 protester, mostly White Nationalists, who are contesting the 2020 election and who are mostly Trump supporters. The J20 protesters are not connected to any political party, they were not contesting the the results of the election, nor defending Hillary Clinton. The J20 activists took action four years ago to denounce fascism and to protest the incoming Trump administration, which was not shy about the White Supremacist, xenophobic, misogynist policies they were going to promote.
Since, the general public is less familiar with the J20 protesters, here is a link that provides a good overview of the harsh sentencing they were facing and how they beat it. GRIID had reported on the harsh sentencing that the J20 protesters faced on several occasions, like our post in July of 2017.
Since the J6 storming of the US Capitol, there have been numerous comparisons to how the police responded to those who forced their way into the Capitol and how the police all across the US have responded to all of the Black Lives Matter rebellions last summer. These comparison are fair, since they point out how White Nationalists were able to storm the US Capitol with minimal harm done to them, while BLM protesters were killed, beaten, pepper-sprayed and shot with rubber bullets. The comparisons are stark.
However, these comparisons are fairly obvious and we should not be content with just making this point and not talking about the larger issue of State Violence. It would be easy to pat ourselves on the back and say, “see, when the right does it, they get special treatment, but when the left does it, they get brutalized.”
We need to start talking about State Violence and how the State can do anything they want to people who don’t follow the rules…..rules determined by those who have power. This is not a new thing, so whether we are talking about the 1798 Sedition Act, the 1918 Sedition Act, the Palmer Raids, the creation of the House Un-American Activities Committee, COINTELPRO, the Patriot Act or the recent proposals coming from GOP State lawmakers and the incoming Biden administration.
The fact that politicians on both sides are calling for new domestic anti-terrorism laws should concern us all, for several reasons. First, the history of domestic terrorism laws has disproportionately been used against Black, Indigenous, Latin, immigrant, Arab-Americans, Muslims, and other communities that are fighting for a more just world. Second, these kinds of laws are always passed during what are often framed as “periods of a national crisis,” thus taking advantage of moments when the public is vulnerable to swift and harsh state responses.
Third, whether it is the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, the National Guard or state and local law enforcement, we need to come to terms with the fact that every one of the groups listed have engaged in state terrorism. When cops murder Black people, that is state terrorism. When the National Guard is brought in to put down an uprising, that is state terrorism. When ICE agents round up members of the undocumented community, that is state terrorism. When the FBI targets Black organizations, that is state terrorism.
Lastly, when people, who are not normally the targets of state violence, remain neutral or support existing/increases in state repression and state terrorism, that makes it easier for the state to get away with the violence they perpetrate against people every day!
Providing a platform for the Far Right: How the Grand Rapids Media reported on the small protest at the Lansing State Capitol on Sunday
The news media loves conflict, since conflict creates a wonderful climate for advertising and consumption.
On Sunday, the Grand Rapids-based news media was no doubt disappointed that the protest that was planned by the far right at the Lansing State Capitol had a tiny turnout.
By all accounts, there were between 20 – 25 members of the far right, mostly boogaloo members, who showed up in Lansing, not so much as to protest, but to posture in front of the news media, a news media that was all too eager to provide them with a platform to spout their propaganda.
MLive, WOODTV8, WZZM 13 and WXMI 17, all framed their stories in similar fashion. First, they let news consumers know that the State Police and the Michigan National Guard were prepared for anything, with cops and soldiers all over Lansing and temporary fencing placed around the Capitol building.
The MLive article provided a platform for two boogaloo members, one person who identified as a Trump supporter and another person who wasn’t convinced there was a fair election, although he disagreed with what happened on January 6. With each person who was cited in the Live article, there is no indication that the reporter questioned or challenged them. Timothy Teagan is the first person cited in the Live article, yet there is no questioning of his comments and no contextual information about him. Thankfully, there are anti-fascists who have been monitoring his twitter account.
The WOODTV8 story wasn’t much different, only in terms of who was cited. In the Channel 8 coverage, there also is no evidence that the reporter questioned those they spoke with.
The channel 13 story took a different approach, talking about how the protest was “peaceful” and that there were no incidents of violence that occurred. WZZM 13’s coverage included a comment from the Lansing Mayor, saying that the protesters were “non-violent.” I’m not sure how anyone who shows up with an assault rifle can be non-violent, but this just reflects how narrowly people understand the issue of violence in our society.
The WXMI story began with the news readers framing the issue as one of security, talking mostly about how State Capitols across the country were preparing to suppress any unlawful activity. The Fox 17 reporter also interviewed Timothy Teagan, who again made claims that go unchallenged. The channel 17 story did cite a Trump supporter and a former State Representative who was defending Gov. Whitmer.
The problem with this type of coverage, which is very event driven, is that it offers up no substantive investigation into far right groups and the real harm they perpetrate. As we noted in October, after a plot to kidnap Gov. Whitmer was foiled, the local news media have failed us miserably when it comes to both informing the public about these far right, White Supremacist and White Nationalists groups. Not only has the local news media failed to inform the public, they continue to provide a neutral platform for those who have done real harm and are likely to commit more acts of violence in the future.
Lastly, it is worth noting that the level of police and military presence at the Lansing Capitol was astounding. While many people believe that the massive mobilization of state was necessary, we all should consider what this will mean for the suppression of dissent in general in Michigan and across the country.
It has been nearly 53 years since Dr. Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated and roughly three decades since his birthday was made a federal holiday. The transition from who the actual Dr. King was and how his legacy has been co-opted, is well documented. I mean, when the most far right public figures, like Glen Beck, cherry pick words from Dr. King, something is really wrong.
Dr. King was under constant surveillance by the FBI, as the new documentary MLK/FBI demonstrates. Dr. King received numerous death threats, because of his role in challenging the White Supremacist Power Structure in the United States, especially after 1965, when Dr. King began speaking out against the system of Capitalism.
In April of 1967, Dr. King came out against the Vietnam War, in his famous Beyond Vietnam speech:
While Dr. King was working on the Poor People’s Campaign, a campaign that sought to elevate the plight of poor people all across the country, with a mass occupation of Washington DC and demands for a massive transfer of wealth from those in power to working class people across the country. In the midst of this campaign, Dr. King went to Memphis to support the struggle of striking city refuse workers, where he once again made the link between racism and capitalism, Dr. King was assassinated.
In the wake of Dr. King’s assassination, rebellions broke out all of the US, not unlike the rebellions that swept the country after a cop publicly Lynch George Floyd in Minnesota. Therefore, it seems to this writer, that for white people, if we are to honor the legacy of Dr. King and the Black Freedom Struggle he was part of, we need to be about the same kind of work of dismantling White Supremacy, Militarism and Capitalism, what Dr. King often referred to as the Evil Triplets.
The kind of tactics that Dr. King and the Black Freedom Struggle used was varied, but the emphasis was surely on confronting power by being in the streets, by disrupting business as usual, by engaging in civil disobedience and by our collective ability to make sacrifices. If White people think for a moment that voting for a Democrat and getting a Democrat in the White House, even controlling the House and the Senate, then you are ignoring history and in denial about how change is made.
We may be focused on the White Nationalists who stormed the US Capitol recently, but Dr. King warned us about who he was really concerned about, when he wrote from a jail cell in 1963:
I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
For those of us who are White Moderates, those who council pragmatism and patience, we need to not only take these words of Dr. King seriously, we need to actively take part in the ongoing Black Freedom Struggle and other struggle for liberation.
There is no shortage of ways to be involved in freedom struggles right now, right here in Grand Rapids. Groups like Justice for Black Lives, Defund the GRPD, Movimiento Cosecha GR, GR Rapid Response to ICE, the Grand Rapids Area Mutual Aid Network, Together We Are Safe and the Grand Rapids Area Tenant Union are all autonomous groups are fighting against state violence, against Neo-liberal Capitalism, against the non-profit industrial complex and against putting our trust in the political parties. These groups practice mutual aid, radical imagination and put their faith in the lived experiences of those most impacted by systems of power and oppression.
In closing, I will leave you with more words from Dr. King, also from his Beyond Vietnam speech, talking about a revolution of values:
“A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies. On the one hand we are called to play the Good Samaritan on life’s roadside, but that will be only an initial act. One day we must come to see that the whole Jericho Road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life’s highway. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. [applause]
A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth. With righteous indignation, it will look across the seas and see individual capitalists of the West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa, and South America, only to take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the countries, and say, “This is not just.” It will look at our alliance with the landed gentry of South America and say, “This is not just.” The Western arrogance of feeling that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them is not just.
A true revolution of values will lay hand on the world order and say of war, “This way of settling differences is not just.” This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation’s homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into the veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice, and love. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.”
As the spectacle of the January 6 actions by White nationalists continues to unfold, it is important that we pay attention to what organizations in West Michigan are saying about what took place.
On Monday, the Acton Institute for the Study of Religion & Liberty, posted an article by their lead editor, Rev. Ben Johnson. The article was a summary of a TV segment from The World Over, a Catholic media outlet, that Acton Institute founder Rev. Sirico was on.
The topic of the TV show that Sirico was on, had to do with the action by White Nationalists at the US Capitol on January 6. Also on the show with Rev. Sirico, was Bill Donohue, President of the ultra-Conservative group known as the Catholic League.
The host of the Catholic TV program framed the issue in a very leading way from the get go, by asking the question: “Why are we seeing more frequent, violent political protests here in the U.S., and what needs to be done about this rioting?”
Such a leading question gave both Donohue and Sirico the opportunity to talk more about the Black Lives Matter protests than the White Nationalists who stormed the US Capitol on January 6.
Rev. Sirico stated, “We need to be outraged – morally outraged – by what we saw in D.C.” for “the same reason that we were morally outraged by what we saw in Seattle, and Portland, and Minneapolis.”
While Rev. Sirico and Bill Donohue kept hitting on the “violence of the left,” the host of the TV show did not question or ask both guests about a fundamental difference between the protests and rebellions that took place after a police officer publicly lynched George Floyd, which was led by Black community members and community organizers, who have been fighting racial oppression for decades all across the US, and the White Nationalists who stormed the US Capitol, primarily to object to the results of the 2020 Presidential Election. The context for these two types of actions are worlds apart.
At one point in the discussion, the Acton Institute founder said, “The ringleaders of riots consist of “a smaller group of irresponsible, ideological people who are bent on destruction, bent on violence, and those people need to be isolated and identified. Those thoughts, those principles, those politics need to be identified and [exorcised] from the body politic.” Rev. Sirico doesn’t provide any information or sources to support such a claim. The fact is, that public lynching of George Floyd by a cop was simply a spark that ignited tremendous righteous indignation from Black and Brown communities that have been subject to various forms of state violence, the effects of brutal Neo-liberal Capitalist austerity measures, on top of a highly radicalized COVID crisis that disproportionately have impacted Black, Brown and Indigenous communities across the US. This was is sharp contrast to the the pathetic grievances of White Nationalists who were primarily motivated by ideology, unlike the lived experiences of those from the Black community.
This type of posturing by the Acton Institute is consistent with what we have been seeing since they were founded in 1990, right here in Grand Rapids. You can go to SourceWatch to read their information about the Acton Institute and see at the bottom of the page that numerous sources from the 1990s and 2000s are from Jeff Smith and from Media Mouse. Over the past decade, you can see that GRIID has written dozens of article about the Acton Institute, documenting numerous ideological stances they take, especially their racist views and their love of Free Market Capitalism.
On Monday, the DeVos-created Great Lakes Education Project posted the following statement on their website:
When it comes to our kids’ schools and learning, Governor Gretchen Whitmer and her administration have spent the last 10 months flouting the science, ignoring the data, and acting against the advice of physicians, medical experts and the CDC.
As Whitmer and her team wilt under the weight of their catastrophically failed vaccine rollout (Michigan is ranked 40th in the United States for COVID-19 vaccine rate), there’s finally some good news for teachers and students.
Last week, the administration announced it’d finally be taking GLEP’s advice, and moving teachers to the front of the line for the COVID-19 vaccine. (Whether they’ll actually be able to get the shots out of the freezer and into their arms is another question.) Then came word that the Governor will gently encourage schools to stop locking kids out of school and allow them to return – in March.
The failures we’ve witnessed over the last 10 months have had a catastrophic impact on Michigan students and families – particularly those in low-income communities. It’ll take years for students to overcome the damage the governor’s unscientific orders caused. Getting them safely back in the classroom is the first, important step on that long journey. It should happen today, not in 7 weeks.
First, this statement comes from GLEP’s Executive Director Beth DeShone, who was a campaign consultant for Dick DeVos, in his failed 2006 campaign to be Governor of Michigan. Since GLEP was created by Betsy DeVos, it makes complete sense that DeShone would be running a DeVos entity.
Second, DeShone offers no clear sources to support the claims she is making in this statement. Yes, she cites physicians, medical experts and the CDC, but with no links to specific pronouncements or data to back up her claims.
Third, if Governor’s Whitmer’s decision to adopt Stay in Place orders was so bad, then why is Michigan near the top of states that has a lower COVID infection/death rate in the US.
Fourth, the recent decision by Gov. Whitmer had absolutely nothing to do with the pronouncements of GLEP, despite their claim. The decision by Whitmer is based on the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services and the guidelines they laid out.
Talent creation and concerns about concerns about the loss of low wage, low skilled jobs
Closer to home, the Grand Rapids-based Talent 2025, has their own take on the COVID crisis and education. Talent 2025 is a group made up primarily of local CEOs who are interested in influencing education policy for the specific purpose of creating future employees – talent – for their companies. In other words, Talent 2025 is interested in how to ensure and increase the profit making capability of the businesses they represent (listed here).
On a recent blog post, Talent 2025 reflected on their work during the COVID crisis in 2020:
In fact, the pandemic has only amplified the importance of our work to ensure a world-class talent supply for West Michigan.
Not only does Talent 2025 shamelessly promote talent creation as the basis of their interest in education, their solution to responding to the low of low wage, low skilled jobs during the pandemic is this:
- The accelerated and permanent loss of many low-skill, low-wage jobs means new strategies and partnerships will be needed to help the people who lost these jobs upskill to get better jobs, often in other industries.
New strategies and partnerships is really just code for, “we will continue to work with the private sector Capitalist Class to find ways to influence education policy in such a way as to maximize the number of skilled laborers for West Michigan companies.
The Great Lakes Education Project and Talent 2025 are just two of the numerous groups that are seeking to influence education policy in Michigan. We would do well to remain vigilant to better understand what their efforts mean for education policy and how it should inform strategies for education justice.
Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy 